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"Fuego"

This is my first attempt at a open spiral vessel. Inspired by William Hunter's work I utilized techniques I learned from Stuart Mortimer's barley twist spindle tutorials and a few J. Paul Fennel tricks for the hollowing and layout. Now that I have acknowledged everyone...

The piece is obviously turned and then carved, the wood is Alder. After turning, a twist spiral was laid out with grid lines and then the troughs of the spiral were carved away. I shaped each spine after freeing it from the rest to avoid breaking the next ones down the line. Once everything was sanded, I airbrushed the yellow and faded in the red. Black gesso was used inside. This was also my first ever attempt at airbrushing. The colors are chestnut spirit stains. Finish is 6 coats of Rustoleum Specialty High Gloss Lacquer.

5 1/2" tall x 3 1/2" dia. x 5mm wall thickness

Unfortunately the high gloss of the finish diminishes the deepness of the red in the photo.
Comments & feedback welcome...

Photo Details

Chris Wright

Registered: November 2004
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Posts: 1,684

0

Date: Thu March 16, 2006
Views: 1,566
Keywords: fuego

Comments

Philip Peak

Chris this is really nice, but not being a fan of coloring my wood, I would have like to have seen it before you colored it.

#1 Thu March 16, 2006 6:58am

Chris Wright

Trust me Phil, it was boring. Alder is very light, almost a blanchy off white with very light grain. Besides, the design idea was to try and symbolically turn a spiral of fire.

#2 Thu March 16, 2006 7:02am

Philip Peak

FYI, I am sending a privarte message your way.

#3 Thu March 16, 2006 7:08am

Philip Peak

I am curious, if alder is such a bland wood, is there a particular reason why you used it and not something else or did you use it because it was bland and were planning on coloring it all along?

#4 Thu March 16, 2006 7:35am

Chris Wright

I had planned to do the coloring all along due to the fire theme. Tell you what, Alder is awesome for getting deep solid colors and still show a little grain.

#5 Thu March 16, 2006 1:39pm

Rick Prevett

For a first attempt, this looks pretty darn good Chris. I can imagine one of the hard parts was to decide what the splines were going to look like. Was the intent for them to be alike?

#6 Thu March 16, 2006 2:21pm

Chris Wright

Thanks Rick, I actually drew the piece out about 2 weeks before starting and had a pretty good vision in my head. It started out for them to be exactly alike, but as I looked at it while working on it I started to think more about the chaotic beauty of fire itself. Fire is a very assymetrical thing, but at the same time I didn't know my limits for this kind of piece yet. So, each has slight differences to give it some uniqueness, but they are relatively similar at the same time. One thing I will do different in the next one is to turn the walls thicker so I have more material to work with. A few of them were actually flexing while I was sanding them. 8-O

#7 Thu March 16, 2006 2:27pm

Larry Charlot

Very nice your ability keeps expanding to new levels

#8 Thu March 16, 2006 2:37pm

MIKE Durham

Mike Durham

Very nice peice Chris, I do like the coloring and blend of the yellow and red.

#9 Thu March 16, 2006 3:45pm

Chris Wright

Thanks Larry and Bull Smile

#10 Thu March 16, 2006 5:13pm

cfuller

That's amazing Chris. Just curious, how many hours in that?
I like the fact that it isn't all even and symetrical. Like Philip, I usually don't care for colored wood vs natural, but that still looks pretty cool. Wonder how it would look in something like cocobolo or bocote. It would probably be a bear to carve.

I appreciate that you gave credit to those that inspired you and their techniques but I think that's a very original piece that will someday be gathering credit from others.

#11 Fri March 17, 2006 1:47am

keith bundy

I like this Chris. Good job at airbrushing for the first time. If possible though, I think if you could get some orange in between the red and the yellow you would more of a flame affect.

#12 Fri March 17, 2006 3:55am

Gil

Pretty work, Chris. It looks like it would be tedious,
and require great care not to break the spirals.

#13 Fri March 17, 2006 4:21am

Chris Wright

Thanks guys. Smile

Curt, I imagine there is about 25 or so hours into this one. I will eventually do one in natural wood colors, but at least the next one has color planned as well.
Keith, I agree on the orange. I thought the yellow and red dyes would blend more and create the orange transition, but it doesn't work that was so much...I got a little but not as much as I hoped...now I know for next time Wink

#14 Fri March 17, 2006 7:25am

jdmathis

Very nice carving Chris. Nice spiral and shape.

#15 Sat March 18, 2006 1:14am